Customer Rating: 
Summary: Cheap videotape spoils wonderful stories
Comment: My four-year-old son loves Little Bear and his friends, and is not too demanding in regard to technology, but even he found this lousy EP/SLP videotape unwatchable, much to his disappointment. I find it unconscionable that the producers of this video would use such poor quality tape and still charge such a hefty price.
Customer Rating:
Summary: The Best of Little Bear!
Comment: Of all the Little Bear videos, this one contains some of the best stories, the ones that my 3-year-old daughter comes back for again and again. She simply loves the stories, and enjoys acting them out with me afterwards. She acts out the "mermaid" story almost ever other day! Like all of the Little Bear videos, this charming collection of four 7-minute tales is so good that it almost justifies watching TV instead of playing outside! These stories are about kids just being kids (or rather, animal kids just being animal kids): exploring, playing with friends, laughing, and using their imagination to make up playful games with eachother. In this way, they are like A.A. Milne's original "Winnie the Pooh" stories, in which the characters' games and discoveries are the main attraction, and we come to love the characters not despite their flaws but because of them. And, in the Little Bear stories, mom and dad are supportive presences, mirroring the real world in which mom and dad are usually the most significant people in young children's lives.
The stories are full of imagination, and are neither too simple, nor too complicated. Similarly, the action unfolds at the perfect pace for young kids, neither the sluggish pace of Mr. Rogers nor the frantic and incomprehensible jump-cuts of the Power Rangers. Little Bear won't insult your kids' intelligence, and you may enjoy them yourself, too!
Unlike so much of TV/movies for kids, the Little Bear stores are not about conflicts with bad people [who, invariably, are bad for no reason other than to move the plot along (e.g., the wicked queen or stepmother, etc.)], or are about loud-mouthed kids who argue with eachother and avoid adults at all times (Rugrats and the like). I recommend all of the Little Bear stories, and the Little Bear show on Nicklelodeon, for any parent who wants a positive alternative to the brain-rotting noise that one usually finds on TV.
I don't know about you, but personally I am tired of trying to answer my daughter when she asks why the Bad Guy is so Bad. I suppose that there is a time and place for simplistic Good-versus-Evil morality tales, but I would much rather teach my daughter about real people and the real world, where people are not simply "Evil" or "Good," and understanding and cooperation are the main skills in life, and the the primary moral imperative is to be a nice person, not to "resist Evil." Again, I don't know about you, but I am saddened by the fact that my daughter does not like Disney stories because they always have so many scary parts. Who likes to explain to their child that Cruella deVille wants to kill the puppies, gleefully and with malice, just to make a pretty fur coat?! Is this really the sort of thing we want to expose young children to??
Hurray for Little Bear!
Customer Rating:
Summary: Super Summer Tales With Little Bear
Comment: My daughter loved this video and all of the Little Bear series. She can't go a day without watching Little Bear at least once. And our whole family enjoys it as well. It is so nice to have a video that shows friendship between characters of different origins and working together to accomplish things.
